~ doing stuff I like. writing about it. writing about other people doing stuff they like.

phoenix sky

Phoenix is at its best in the morning. Take a moment before the day begins, before the anxieties kick in, before your to-do list begs the first check mark. Take your eyes and ears off your phone and look up. The city is tented by a brilliant, stretching sheet of color and light. Let your gaze scan slowly from east to west. Start with the pinks standing guard from the peaks of the Superstition Mountains. Watch how they waft into orange and yellow tufts, gently pulling the sun higher and higher. If you’re lucky, you might see a streak of purple bordering the massive scope of blue. That blue, that prevailing blue, which dominates the rest of the expanse westward over the city, over the highways, to the Colorado River, to the Imperial Sand Dunes, to the Pacific Ocean. Relax your focus and your vision will start buzzing from the sheer intensity of uninterrupted iridescence.

The desert sky is studded on all sides by mountains at its edges. Splinters from skyscrapers are few and far between. It’s just so OPEN. How many other cities get to have this? How many allow for the Earth to have her space? High above our personal responsibilities, our collective frenzy, hangs the boundless ceiling of our planet which gives shelter to every living thing. It’s a real, ever constant connection to the rest of this world which we know is there but may never see. Quiet but commanding, it tells you that while you are small and your day might seem daunting, you are not alone. And to remind yourself of that, at least here in Phoenix, all you have to do is look up.